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OpenAI and its chief executive, Sam Altman, have been sued by the families of five children and a teacher who were killed in a mass shooting at a Canadian elementary school earlier this year, and a seventh youth who was wounded.<\/p>\n
Jose Luis Magana\/Associated Press<\/p>\n
OpenAI and its chief executive, Sam Altman, have been sued by the families of five children and a teacher who were killed in a mass shooting at a Canadian elementary school earlier this year, and a seventh youth who was wounded. In seven separate lawsuits filed Wednesday, lawyers said the artificial intelligence giant encouraged the shooter\u2019s violent tendencies, then decided to protect its profits by remaining silent.<\/p>\n
After months of interactions between the now-deceased killer, a young woman, and OpenAI\u2019s widely used ChatGPT chatbot, Altman and his colleagues \u201cknew the shooter was planning the attack (and) made the conscious decision not to warn authorities,\u201d lawyers for one of the victims, a 12-year-old boy, said one of the lawsuits in federal court in San Francisco, where OpenAI\u2019s headquarters is located.<\/p>\n
They said ChatGPT \u201cdeepened (her) violent fixation and pushed (her) toward the attack.\u201d Last June, the suit said, OpenAI\u2019s automated system \u201cflagged the Shooter\u2019s ChatGPT account for gun violence activity and planning.\u201d<\/p>\n
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But Altman knew that disclosure of OpenAI\u2019s assessment of the dangers and its contacts with the young woman \u201ccould end his tenure \u2026 and wipe out the company\u2019s valuation,\u201d attorney Ali Moghaddas wrote in the suit. He and his associates \u201cdid the math and decided that the safety of the children of Tumbler Ridge was an acceptable risk,\u201d Moghaddas said.<\/p>\n
In February, the 18-year-old woman fatally shot her mother and 11-year-old brother in their home in Tumbler Ridge, a small mining town in British Columbia. She then drove to a secondary school with a rifle, killed five children and a teacher and wounded 27 others before killing herself.<\/p>\n
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<\/p>\n Add Preferred Source<\/p>\n <\/a><\/p>\n Altman publicly apologized to the community<\/a> last week and said his company should have spoken up.<\/p>\n